Homemade Sausage Making

This morning it was time to try the sopressatta since it has lost 30% of its weight after the fermentation period, so it's technically a higher loss than that. It was started 35 days ago. I am happy to report that it turned out very well, great flavour and texture, but next time I will add a little more heat. (Rev. Ducko is converting me with his barrage of daily chili sermons) Only a tiny amount of case hardening on one side, but essentially negligible. I used 60mm. collagen casings, R2 Naturin brand, which have a special coating that forms a cream color mould on the exterior.

Redzed, congratulations - those look fantastic. I'm envious, because the one attempt I made at soprasata didn't turn out well. (Tried making it without a curing chamber.) You really knocked this one flat!

Jeff

Worth it all! The effort pays off! Congrats pal. You've done an outstanding job.

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

The latest to come out of my curing chamber was my breasola. I used a 1.2 kg eye of round, dry cured for 12 days and then two months in in the chamber. Weight loss was 40%. There is a bit of case hardening because the beef was hung uncased, something I will not do again. All in all, I'm very happy with it. Nice texture, complex savoury flavour with a hint of mustiness. Had some today drizzled with olive oil and lemon juice, some black olives and a glass of Primitivo. Good stuff!

Verrrrrry nice Red! Yum - Yum!

Hi Red,
Man o man, this looks great. Case hardening? I can't see any. If you are talking about that darkish rim around the dried beef, you are splitting hairs.
You can be proud of what you made!!!!!!!!
Hell, I would be over the moon and just in time for Christmas too.
Congratulations.
Jan.

o maaaaan - that is good lookin!

A) must make bresaoala!
B) must buy meat slicer!

yer killin me!

Wow! my first bresaola is in curing phase right now, I can only hope its a 10th as good looking as that!

Hey Cryan, we'll be waiting for a few photos! Don't forget to recharge the batteries in your camera!

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

Yesterday I cut into my Lomo Embuchado made according to Marianski's recipe, with the exception that I used smoked paprika rather than regular. Extremely pleased with it, it's better than my Lonzino. Cured evenly and has that mellow, salty, peppery flavour with a hint of paprika. Cured for 60 days with a weight loss of 45%. As with some of my other solid muscle cured products, I will be casing them next time.

Red, all I can see is your photo of Babe Ruth, point the bat where he's going to hit the home run next. Way to go Buddy.

Red,
If you keep this up, I mean posting pisctures all these beautiful cured, dried meats.
All our members will finish up with monster inferiority complexes.
What you done for me with all these photo's is getting me rather worked up and stressed out about starting my own curing/ drying chamber.
My wife tells me already that I am very hard to live with.
Cheers MATE and congratulations again on your charcutrie endeavours.
Jan.

Thanks Jan, I think that I've been lucky in this whole thing and I'm glad I made several products to get going rather than one or two. Certainly learned a lot in the past 3 months. I have a coppa that I will be tasting later today and will post pics. I also have a salami genoa that seems to be stuck as far as the drying, and is still quite soft when I squeeze it.

I'm looking forward to seeing your efforts in that mega chamber you are constructing. And as far as your wife's complaint about you being hard to live with, that is a standard line that all women use. Just smile and nod and continue doing what you were doing.

Wow, that looks great man!!!

Hi Redzed: I am live Victoria and I am just getting into cured sausage. I would love to see your setup and pick your brain for any ideas.

Bert,